motivations

torrentfreak.com

When Megaupload was raided in January, questions were raised as to why the U.S. Government acted so aggressively against a company that seemingly played by the rules. It’s no secret that the MPAA provides the authorities with “leads” for criminal investigations on a regular basis, but considering the size and...

Comments on 'Kim Dotcom: Joe Biden Ordered the Megaupload Shutdown':

techcrunch.com

Editor’s Note: TechCrunch columnist Semil Shah currently works at Votizen and is based in Palo Alto. You can follow him on Twitter @semil SV Angel founding partner David Lee joined us backstage today for an informal discussion about a range of topics. Lee recently began writing on the new blogging platform Svbtle, sharing wisdom from his...

www.theverge.com

It wasn't that long ago that choosing between Mac and Windows meant a choice between processing architectures as well as operating systems. Apple's OS X was running on PowerPC, Microsoft's Windows was owning the x86 market, and the two seemed destined never to cross paths. But unbeknownst to the...

Comments on 'The humble beginnings of OS X on Intel':

www.readwriteweb.com

Years have passed since Google was an idealistic upstart that vowed to do no evil. Now it's an immense public company with diverse interests to protect. And that's what it was doing when it threatened to sue websites that enable users to download audio tracks from YouTube videos. Lawyers representing Google recently...

www.readwriteweb.com

Rock the Vote, the nonprofit group focused on engaging young voters, is kicking off a joint effort with PromoJam, a Los Angeles-based social media promotions startup, with the goal of registering 1.5 million new voters for this fall’s presidential race - and challenging restrictions on voter registration. The mobile-focused...

venturebeat.com

Web-clipping and bookmarking tool Clipboard is dressing up in its best new features and making a grand public debut today. The site, which has been invite-only since it launched in October, is finally open to anyone who wants to sign up. It is also introducing a new Boards feature,...

Comments on 'Powerful new bookmarking tool Clipboard opens to the public':

paidcontent.org

In a strongly worded opinion, US District Judge Denise Cote strongly rejected requests by Apple and book publishers to throw out a class action suit that accuses them of price-fixing. Citing ongoing state, federal and international anti-trust investigations, Cote flatly rejected arguments that Apple and the publishers had acted independently...

www.techdirt.com

We've written a lot about Louis CK since the huge success of his direct-to-fan sales strategy for the video from his last tour, and he continues to be one of the best examples of how being open, human and awesome is an important part of success these days. Now, while...

www.theatlantic.com

When Rebecca MacKinnon was working for CNN in Beijing from 1992 to 2001, she and her fellow expats expected that the coming age of global networking would strongly undermine the Communist Party's grip on the reigns. But a decade later, she writes, "I grew to believe that we were naive."...

Comments on 'The Fight for a Fair and Free Internet':

gigaom.com

Facebook is testing new features that would give children under 13 access to the giant social network, according to a report published Monday in the Wall Street Journal. Although one version of this new program would require children to have accounts that are linked to an adult so that...

www.geekwire.com

Real Estate Signs. Photo: A. McLin Why did Metrolist — the largest Multiple Listing Service in Colorado — cut ties with Zillow-owned Diverse Solutions? Online real estate watchers, including several on GeekWire, have been wondering about the motivations of that decision ever since word spread earlier today. I was curious...

arstechnica.com

Aurich Lawson Apple is not officially on the hook yet for allegedly colluding with publishers to fix e-book prices, but US District Judge Denise Cote had some harsh words about the company's actions. Cote denied Apple and five publishers their request to have a class-action suit over the alleged...

www.businessinsider.com

Social is weaving its way further into the retail industry every day. It's not limited to web-only companies who are trying to integrate social networks into their websites. Brick-and-mortar retailers are working hard not to be left behind too. Social is something that's guaranteed to greatly influence what the future...

Comments on 'PRESENTING: What 'Social' Means For The Future Of Commerce':

www.readwriteweb.com

Last week, the CloudStack controversy questioned whether there can be more than one open source cloud. Evan Prodromou, founder and CEO of StatusNet, says no, arguing that it's "going to be better for everyone" if there is a single contender for open source cloud computing thanks to network effects....

www.guardian.co.uk

How 7digital, Addison Lee, IndieSkies, Escapist Games and Distinction found developing for Microsoft's smartphonesDevelopers have created more than 100,000 apps for Windows Phone, as Microsoft continues its efforts to make the platform a viable alternative to iOS and Android for app developers. But how are those efforts going down?To find...

www.theverge.com

Journalist Parmy Olson spent a year researching anonymous, the loosely defined hacker collective that's antagonized everyone from the Church of Scientology to PayPal to the CIA. Her new book, We Are Anonymous: Inside the Hacker World of LulzSec, Anonymous and the Global Cyber Insurgency, follows the group from its...

gigaom.com

When the Carrier IQ controversy broke late last year, the only major U.S. operator not implicated in the phone tracking scandal was Verizon Wireless, which categorically denied ever using the IQ Agent software in its devices. Well, it turns out Verizon is introducing phone monitoring software as well, starting with...

Comments on 'Verizon shows there’s a right way to track phones: with permission':

www.readwriteweb.com

In our story yesterday on Encyclopedia Britannica's demise, we covered the basics. Jim Romenesko asked Britannica.com editor Charlie Madigan for his thoughts here and they are very poignant and somewhat saddening. Mine as well. This ignominious end has brought forth many memories for me. When I was just starting out...

allthingsd.com

Google is getting back in the business of selling Android phones direct to consumers. The search giant had sold the Nexus One directly to consumers over the Web, but got out of that business back in 2010. On Tuesday, though Google is announcing that it will start selling an unlocked...

venturebeat.com

“Design is the new battleground” is the tagline for VentureBeat’s upcoming mobile tech conference, MobileBeat. That phrase is meant to capture the importance of design to mobile devices, apps, websites, and more. But for the U.S. Army, design has met the battleground in a much more literal way. As...

www.fosspatents.com

Major news agencies (Bloomberg, Dow Jones, Reuters) report on a "settlement offer" that Google subsidiary Motorola Mobility made Microsoft, and Microsoft's response, describing this as "little more than an effort to change the subject" at time when antitrust authorities are increasingly concerned over standard-essential patents (SEP) abuse.I'll get to the...

pandodaily.com

For the next two weeks, I’m “going Google.” I’ll be fully dependent upon Google’s platforms, hardware, and approved methods. I’ll be working off of a Chromebook, Chromebox, Android phone and tablet, and using Google’s Web apps. Changing my operating system so drastically may seem crazy, but there are honest, practical...

Comments on 'IBM eyes Brazil market with investment in SIX Automacao':

paidcontent.org

The BBC and its commercial department may each sell different kinds of digital TV show downloads to UK viewers, following news of the radical plan codenamed “Project Barcelona”. paidContent reported in March the public service broadcaster was negotiating with TV show producers to build an iTunes Store rival offering new and...

www.readwriteweb.com

HP's Itanium debacle provides plenty of lessons for anyone who is willing to pay attention. For the past decade, HP has been making a valiant, if extremely misguided, attempt to support the high-end Itanium chip architecture and the HP-UX Unix implementation that runs on it. Oracle's open letter and drop...

pandodaily.com

Note from Paul: A couple of days ago, I wrote a column about Scripped’s “Showwatcher” — a new site, affiliated with Kevin Spacey, that encourages would-be entertainment writers to produce blog posts for no financial compensation. Put mildly, I had some concerns about the ethics of that kind of business....

www.geekwire.com

Microsoft announced plans this week to launch Halo 4 on Nov. 6, kicking off a new era for the blockbuster Xbox 360 franchise. If the date sounds familiar, it’s because there is another pretty big event also happening on that day: the U.S. presidential election. The coincidence has generated all...

venturebeat.com

This sponsored post is produced by Street Fight. It’s fair to say we’re entering hyperlocal marketing 2.0. After a much-hyped explosion, the daily deal industry is now in the process of consolidating; smaller players are falling off while the bigger players are looking beyond the deal to create customer loyalty...

Comments on 'Understand the ‘local consumer,’ and you’ll understand how to serve SMBs':

venturebeat.com

Recently, people have questioned my motivations around writing about Groupon. They have tried to insinuate that I’m writing about Groupon for personal financial gain. Anyone who believes that doesn’t know the first thing about how financial markets work. I have largely acted against my own personal financial interests when it...